0:04

It's around 8 o'clock in the morning and

0:07

the Blue Spring State Park is

0:09

quiet, at least for now. The

0:12

teal blue water that is all around

0:15

there is still and the boardwalk that

0:17

runs alongside the water is mostly empty.

0:20

There is still time before the big

0:22

morning rush when all the visitors arrive.

0:26

Cora Burcham is out on the water in

0:28

a canoe. She is not taking

0:30

in the sights. She is

0:32

taking measurements, things like the water

0:35

temperature, which usually hovers

0:37

somewhere around 72 degrees. And

0:41

more importantly, we have literally hundreds

0:43

of manatees come to the spring for

0:46

the warm water. So we go out on

0:48

the research canoe every morning and count them

0:50

and identify them. So that's how we see them

0:53

up close. And

0:55

if you're a manatee, the hottest vacation

0:58

spot there is, is Blue Spring State

1:00

Park, just

1:07

about an hour outside of Orlando. So

1:10

on a cold winter morning, you can literally

1:12

see hundreds of them in the

1:14

protected spring. There's

1:17

a lot of mist coming out of the water and

1:19

the manatees are just chilling. The

1:22

rest, they play, the nurse, they're young.

1:25

People can observe them from the boardwalk, which

1:27

the water is very clear. So it's a

1:29

really nice place to see them in their

1:31

natural habitat without actually disturbing them. I'm

1:35

Dylan Thoress and this is Atlas Obscura,

1:38

a celebration of the world's strange,

1:40

incredible and wondrous places. This

1:43

episode was produced in partnership with

1:45

Visit Florida. And today we're getting

1:48

acquainted with Florida's gentle giants, the

1:50

manatee. We are going

1:52

to learn about their favorite winter vacation habits

1:55

and at a time when these beloved

1:57

sea cows are facing many, many threats.

2:00

This serene park provides a unique

2:02

refuge and a conservation

2:04

success story. All

2:07

of that and some

2:09

time hanging out with manatees

2:12

after this. If

2:23

you're looking for a trip full of

2:25

the extraordinary and unexpected, then you need

2:27

to get off the beaten path and

2:30

head to Missouri. The City

2:32

Museum in St. Louis has got to be

2:34

one of the coolest places that I have

2:36

ever been, but it's just

2:38

one of many wonders found in Missouri.

2:40

You can play a chess game at

2:42

the World Chess Hall of Fame, also

2:44

home to the world's largest chess piece.

2:47

You can tour a reimagined ghost town

2:49

brought back to life as outdoor art

2:51

at Red Oak II in Carthage, or

2:54

go on a crazy underwater

2:56

adventure at Bonterre Mine, one

2:59

of the world's largest manmade caverns

3:01

and freshwater scuba diving resorts,

3:04

or throw back craft beers 50 feet

3:07

underground at O'Malley's Pub in Weston.

3:09

Missouri is a place full of

3:11

surprise and delight. Don't

3:13

miss out on Missouri, because whether

3:16

it is weird, wondrous, or the

3:18

world's largest, there is an M.O.

3:20

for every traveler in Missouri. Find

3:23

yours at visitmo.com.

3:28

As long as you're on vacation, you're

3:31

happy, right? But the truth

3:33

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3:35

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3:38

of them. Celebrity cruises.

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you'll never want to vacation any other

3:45

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weekend Caribbean escapes for a quick

3:49

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3:51

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3:54

see why nothing comes close to

3:56

Celebrity Cruises. Ships Registry,

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Malta, and Exeter. If

4:06

you had asked me about 12 years ago if I

4:08

could see myself working in Florida with sea cows, I

4:10

don't really think so. You never

4:12

know where things take you sometimes. Here's

4:15

Cora Bertram again. You can find

4:17

her out there on most winter mornings

4:19

in a canoe on Blue Spring, counting

4:21

manatees. But 12 years ago,

4:23

Cora's life looked pretty different. She had

4:26

moved from Germany to New York. She

4:28

was working as a film and TV producer.

4:32

And then one day, Cora got a gig

4:34

on a reality show filming in

4:37

Florida. It had nothing to do

4:39

whatsoever with wildlife or manatees. But

4:41

it brought me down to Miami for a couple

4:43

of days in December. And that's when I discovered

4:46

there is a creature called a manatee. I

4:48

had never in my life heard of a

4:51

manatee before. And believe it or

4:53

not, it was not even a real living manatee. It

4:55

was a stuffed animal, like a plushie. And

4:58

I was fascinated. Today, Cora

5:01

is the multimedia director and a research

5:03

associate for the Save the Manatee Club.

5:06

It's a conservation nonprofit co-founded

5:08

by none other than

5:10

Jimmy Buffett. Yes, that's the

5:12

same Jimmy Buffett, the one and only. In

5:16

her free time, Cora has made

5:18

a documentary about manatees. She volunteers

5:20

with Manatee Rescue Rehabilitation. And

5:23

she helps with this daily count at Blue

5:25

Spring State Park. Their

5:27

work is coming at a time when manatees need

5:29

more help than ever. But people

5:31

like Cora are unwaveringly dedicated

5:34

to helping them. This

5:36

is really, you know, large aquatic

5:38

mammal, has no significant natural predators,

5:40

doesn't hunt anything, doesn't

5:43

harm anything. And they like to hang out and,

5:45

you know, be in the warm water and just

5:47

go about their thing. They're just

5:49

kind of the true Floridians. Few

5:52

things scream Florida louder

5:55

than manatees. In fact,

5:57

they are the state's official marine mammal.

6:00

Just in case you have also never seen

6:02

a manatee in real life, I can say

6:04

that I have not ever seen a manatee.

6:07

They have this kind of funny walrus

6:09

face with a cow's body and a

6:11

flipper tail. When Christopher

6:13

Columbus spotted one in 1492, he

6:16

thought it was some kind of mermaid. They're

6:19

also enormous. They typically

6:21

weigh about a thousand pounds, but

6:23

some get much larger. And to

6:26

go back to the Florida theme, there is

6:28

something very snowbirdy about

6:30

these manatees, which is

6:32

they really, really do not like

6:34

the cold. Manatees,

6:37

although they look really large and fat,

6:39

they only have a very, very small

6:41

layer of blood that's only about an

6:43

inch or so, which is very, very

6:46

little for such a large animal. So not

6:48

like a walrus or like a seal or

6:50

something. So in the wintertime, when waterways drop

6:52

below 68 degrees, they

6:55

have to seek out these warm water sources.

6:59

So when November hits, manatees

7:01

begin to trickle into blue spring for

7:03

the winter. They're seeking its

7:06

very temperate 72 degree water. First,

7:10

there are the manatee mothers with their calves,

7:13

who are especially sensitive to the

7:15

cold. By January, hundreds of

7:17

manatees are hanging out in the

7:19

park. Outside of the winter months,

7:22

manatees can be pretty solitary

7:24

creatures, and they travel all

7:26

over the place. In the summer, they've

7:29

been found in Georgia and the

7:31

Carolinas. Some go west to Texas.

7:34

And in 2009, one named

7:36

Ilya famously made it all the

7:38

way up to Cape Cod. Imagine

7:41

being in Cape Cod and seeing a manatee.

7:43

You would be extremely confused.

7:47

But during the winter, one of the

7:49

spots where you can reliably find manatees

7:52

is in Blue Spring State Park, which means

7:54

it's also a great place to study

7:56

them and keep tabs on their population.

8:00

that's really important for us is not just

8:02

to get a number and do a count

8:04

but really identify who the manatees are so

8:06

we can tell you how many individuals we've

8:08

seen, how many we have seen returning from

8:10

the previous season so that's really important data

8:12

for us to have. And folks like

8:14

Cora not only count them but they they

8:16

get to know them, they get to know their personalities,

8:19

they give them names. I

8:21

always like to say it's almost like family coming home

8:23

and every day you're like oh so-and-so is back or

8:25

so-and-so has a new calf. Rolling

8:29

up to Blue Spring is kind of like

8:31

popping into your local dive bar or

8:34

maybe I guess we should say your

8:36

local margaritaville. It has

8:38

regulars. There are

8:40

folks like Brutus. He's

8:43

the ultimate old-timer. He was first spotted in

8:45

Blue Spring in 1970 and he is huge.

8:47

He's just a little shy of 2,000 pounds.

8:49

He's also known

8:53

for his spirited pursuit of

8:55

female manatees. We do

8:57

have Annie. She's one of my favorites. She was

8:59

actually rescued as a small orphan calf, rehabilitated

9:02

and then released at Blue Spring and she's had

9:04

I believe five calves of her own right now.

9:07

There's Lenny. He is the resident couch

9:09

potato. He kind of just likes to

9:11

snooze. We have one

9:14

that's called Deep Dend. He to me is

9:16

extremely fascinating because he goes all the way

9:18

down to Riviera Beach and then he comes

9:20

back to Blue Spring. So, a rural traveler

9:22

is named after having a dent by his

9:24

tail and one by his head. Getting

9:27

to know these manatees and their stories, you also

9:30

get to see the problems that they face in

9:32

the wild. One of

9:34

their biggest problems is just boats. Deep

9:37

Dend's tail dent is

9:39

from a propeller strike. The manatees

9:42

are very slow-moving and oftentimes

9:44

they cannot get out of a fast

9:46

moving boat or they wait quickly

9:48

enough or they're in very shallow water. So,

9:50

you know, some boaters inadvertently

9:53

hit them and then they are, you

9:55

know, oftentimes suffer from boat strike injuries.

9:58

On average, boaters kill more than a

10:00

hundred manatees a year, which

10:02

is a lot considering that the population is

10:04

only estimated to be between seven and 11,000.

10:08

Many manatees are rescued with boat

10:11

strike injuries so severe that they

10:13

need really extensive rehabilitation. Manatees

10:16

can also frequently become entangled in

10:18

fishing line and other fishing equipment.

10:21

And in these cases, although they survive, they

10:23

can have some really noticeable scars. We

10:26

recognize hundreds of them by the scars that

10:28

they have. That's how we tell them apart.

10:31

In fact, that's one of the things that makes Blue

10:33

Spring so popular for

10:35

manatees. Between mid-November to early

10:37

April, there's no fishing, boating,

10:40

swimming, paddling, anything allowed

10:42

in the spring run. And

10:44

it leaves manatees free to frolic, to

10:46

hang out, to do what they do.

10:50

Although this was not always the case. In

10:53

the early 1970s, French oceanographer Jacques

10:55

Cousteau visited Blue Spring to make

10:57

an episode of his TV show

10:59

about manatees. And at the

11:01

time, the area was a popular

11:04

fishing and boating spot. The

11:06

program was so popular that it actually convinced

11:08

the state of Florida to buy the land,

11:10

which is privately owned, and then turn it

11:13

into a state park. Over

11:15

time, the spring run favored by

11:17

manatees was gradually closed off to

11:19

recreation. At some point, it

11:22

was decided that it would be in the

11:24

best interest for swimmers and for manatees to

11:26

close off the spring run completely to any

11:29

human activity in the winter time. So there was then

11:31

in stages, so a certain area was closed off, and

11:34

then it was extended. And

11:36

then it eventually became a real sanctuary.

11:38

And I really think, looking back at

11:40

when that was established, we really saw

11:42

skyrocketing numbers of manatees

11:44

after that. So you can really see how

11:47

those protections did make a difference for them.

11:52

If you look at the winter manatee counts

11:54

in Blue Spring over time, the

11:56

numbers tell a real story. In

11:58

the early days of research at the park, they

12:01

would top out at around 40 manatees

12:03

a day in peak winter season.

12:06

Compare that to today. This

12:08

season, once again, we had record counts

12:11

of manatees. I feel we've been beating

12:13

the previous season's record every single year.

12:15

We counted over 700 manatees in a

12:17

single day, and the park staff, who

12:19

also just counts from the boardwalk, their

12:21

count was even higher than ours. And

12:24

critically, Blue Spring provides a natural, warm

12:26

water source for the manatees. When manatees

12:28

can't find a place like Blue Spring,

12:31

they gather in more unconventional places,

12:33

like in the outflow of power

12:36

plants along the Florida coast. And

12:39

as more of these plants go offline and

12:41

transition to renewables, manatee

12:43

researchers are trying to figure out ways

12:45

to redirect these manatees to the natural

12:48

warm water spots. Cora says

12:50

this is why places like Blue Spring

12:52

are more important than ever. This

12:55

is really a site where manatees can come

12:57

and be undisturbed. So they can rest, they

12:59

can nurse their calves, they can go about

13:01

the business. There's a lot of food sources

13:03

in the area. So this is a really

13:05

wonderful place for manatees to be. And we

13:08

do see manatees from other springs or other

13:10

areas come to Blue Spring because

13:12

it's a protected area. So they can

13:14

just be undisturbed. It's

13:17

just this amazing conservation success. I wish

13:20

we would see that everywhere in Florida. You

13:27

too can go and walk

13:29

that boardwalk and see

13:31

manatees up close and personal at Blue

13:33

Spring. Be sure to visit in the

13:35

wintertime between November and March. That's when

13:37

the manatees are hanging out there. Although

13:39

in the summer, when the manatees are

13:41

elsewhere, Blue Spring is

13:44

a really beautiful place to kayak

13:46

and snorkel. If you can't make

13:48

it to Florida, the Save the

13:50

Manatee Club has webcams at Blue

13:52

Spring where you can try to

13:54

identify various manatees for yourself. And

13:57

if you fall in love with one manatee,

13:59

you can Adopt one. Deep Dent,

14:01

Brutus, Annie, Lenny, they are all on

14:03

there. You can go adopt your very

14:05

own manatee. I

14:07

want to give a special thanks to Dr.

14:09

Iska Larkin, manatee researcher at the University of

14:12

Florida, for providing information for this story. Our

14:30

podcast is a co-production of Atlas

14:32

Obscura and Stitcher Studios. This

14:35

episode was produced by Amanda

14:38

McGowan, Johanna Mayer. The production

14:40

team includes Dylan Thuras, Doug

14:43

Baldinger, Chris Naka, Camille Stanley,

14:45

Manolo Morales, Baudelaire, Gabby Gladney.

14:48

Our technical director is Casey Holford.

14:51

This episode was mixed by Luz Fleming.

14:53

If you want to learn more, be

14:55

sure to visit atlasobscura.com. There's a link

14:57

in our episode description. And our theme

14:59

and end credit music is by Sam

15:01

Tindall. I'm Dylan Thuras, wishing

15:04

you all the wonder in the world. I

15:06

will see you next time. This.

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